Racial Profiling Since 9-11 Term Paper

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Racial Profiling Since 911

The racial profiling implies the discrimination by police to detail a person as suspect basing on the racial manifestations. In the present days the process of racial profiling has changed to a great extent. (Harris, 58) The racial profiling, till the present period was indicated towards the practice of police dragging over the black male drivers discriminately on the empirically valid but morally denounced hypothesis that they are more prone to be involved in crime. Presently, the very term is used parallel to the concept of racial discrimination. However, the racial profiling implies to anything specific that means logical discrimination that is racial prejudice with a non-racist justification. (Kinsley, p: B07)

The dependence on racial factor is quite hard to cabin or confine one aspect of law implementation. The racial profiles establish and reinforce popular labels about the inclination for criminality among the racial minorities. Popular labels are being resorted to vindicate the targeting of African-Americans, Latina/os, Asian-Americans, Native Americans, and Arabs and Muslims in law implementation activity. Regrettably, once the race is considered subject to an area of law implementation, it sometimes directly or indirectly affects the other areas as well. Depending upon the race of one group for targeted enforcement makes it open to justify the same process against other racial minority groups, even when the basis depended upon are quite different. (Johnson, 70)

The Americans were acknowledged the racial profiling before September 11, as a type of institutional discrimination that was continued for a long time without any resistance. Anti-profiling bills in one form or other have been enacted in thirteen states. Police originations all over the country had initiated to accumulate information on all traffic stops in order to perform better and without prejudice. Congress leader John Conyers, Jr., of Michigan and Senator Russell Feingold of Wisconsin have initiated End Racial Profiling Act of 2001, at the level of federal government that was directed towards addressing and reducing biased traffic stops through a complete, management-based, carrot-and-stick approach. The September, 11 incident necessitated radical reformulation of the racial profiling concern. The racial profiling suddenly was to be viewed not as the law implementation technique with isolation and hurting a particular group without doing anything substantial towards reducing the crime and drug; without being an instrument for ensuring national security particularly in the airports. (Harris, 58)

The dependence of the government on racial profiling has extended revolutionarily ever since the September 11 incident as observed by Curt Goering, the senior deputy executive director of the U.S. section of Amnesty. The assessment made by Amnesty International on the prevailing information reveals that about 32 million Americans as much as the total population of Canada are prone to racial profiling and that of 87 million Americans about one third of the population are vulnerable to such abuse. A concentration on the 'War on terror' declared following the incident of September 11, for the most part was on one group of people without any prejudice to the fact of individual involvement in terrorist activities. (Racial Profiling Much Worse since 9/11, Amnesty Says) The public debate with regard to the direction of the profiling has also reformulated from African-Americans, Latinos and other minorities alleged of domestic crime, particularly drug crime, to Arab-Americans, Muslims, and other Middle Eastern origin those posed to be the homicide hijackers of September 11. (Harris, 59)

In this way the Arab and Muslim infiltrates constituted new targets for the racial profiling and became vulnerable to racist acts, and denial of civil liberties. (Bai; Tang, 27) Before September 11, a majority of Americans about 80% were antagonistic towards the process of racial profiling. According to Michelle Alexander of the American Civil Liberties Union -ACLU of Northern California, a sudden turnaround in public opinion in that respect was quite evident ever since the occurrence of the incident. The opinion polls presently reveal that about 70% of Americans think that type of racial profiling is essential and agreeable towards guaranteeing public safety. The immigrant terrorists of Saudi Arabia, Egypt or Pakistan mostly in the age group of twenties and thirties are included in the profiling. Mostly they reside in the one of the six states viz. Texas, New Jersey, California, New York, Michigan, or Florida. (Davis, 18)

Most probably they are occupied with some sort of distrustful activities like training on flying lessons, obtaining a driver license. Fulfillment of at least one of these profiles is considered sufficient to interrogate.

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The struggle against terrorism is similarly active. The declaration for struggle in this regard allows the law implementation for racial profiling in line with the struggle against illicit drug trafficking and drug abuse. (Davis, 18) The war on terror in many ways is viewed as challenging especially with overlapping of immigration and criminal law enforcement. The supporting facts indicate that only the non-citizens were involved in the attacks of 9/11. Further they belonged to a particular religion and of a common racial and ethnic background. Like the criminal law implementation it also proved extremely difficult to limit the reliance on 'race' once it entered the law enforcement calculus. (Johnson, 72)

The potential abuse in law implementation is inherent in authorizing the law enforcement personnel to depend on the appearance of a person to categorize them into a certain racial, ethnic and religious groups. This is true more particularly when the victim could succeed in detecting the race of the perpetrator of the crime and the police also extensively depend on racial criterions in investigating the crime. 'Race' is too broader concept to be used for the law enforcement purposes. However, this appear to be one of the problems in the time immediately after September 11, with the federal government depending upon the facts of detecting any Arab and Muslim non-citizens that match the conditions of being young and male, non-citizen in the country particularly holding a certain type of visa. The law enforcement authorities never feel it essential to have any sort of individualized act of misdoings raising their suspicion. (Johnson, 73)

Within the short span of time immediately after the 9/11 incident, the Department of Justice propounded the rules amounting to an extensive program of preventive detentions. This has been observed to be the first ever large scale confinement of people belonging to a particular group on the basis of the nationality or descent since the mass captivity of Japanese-Americans during World War II. The federal agents spread through Arab, Muslim and South Asian neighborhoods countrywide dragging the men from sidewalks, as well as their homes, workplaces and mosques immediately within hours of the terrorist attacks. The interrogation and captivity thousands of persons were being carried out under an unparalleled mask of secrecy, leaving wives, children, classmates and employers wondering where these people had been taken. (Racial Profiling Much Worse since 9/11, Amnesty Says)

The Federal Bureau of Prisons imposed a ban on communications deterring the detainees from contacting family, friends, press and even the advocates. Moreover, in another action of almost unparalleled secrecy the attorney general ordered that the deportation hearings of immigrants deemed of special interests to the government should not be open to the public and the press, effectively concealing all immigration hearings of Arabs and Muslims. In a circumstance of harshly evocative are the disappearances of labor and student activists in Argentina during 1980s, Arab, Muslim and South Asian men that were grabbed off the streets of American cities. America now is having its own 'disappeared'. (Racial Profiling Much Worse since 9/11, Amnesty Says)

An opinion poll performed during the last month by Ben Dixon and Association along with Amnesty could find out that the Arab-Americans are prone to the racial profiling with more intensity about three times more than the rest of the non-Hispanic white population and the Muslims are more prone to profiling particularly after September 11. (Racial Profiling: Testimony from Amnesty International USA's hearings on Racial Profiling. Victims Accounts of Racial Profiling While Traveling Through Airports) The isolation consequent to the results from terrorism profiling is multiplying complexly and in an insensitive manner in which so far it has been carried out. As illustrated, most of the Arabs and Muslims those have attempted to cooperate with authorities and to conform to the law have consistently been met by oral and also physical abuse; complete tactlessness to their cultural and religious traditions; and a general lack of respect. As was in the circumstances of 'driving while Black' such dealings with the Arabs caused many of them to alter their behavior in order to avoid confrontations with authorities. A Lebanese man residing in Great Falls, Virginia, Khaled Saffuri expressed his experience of ensuring to shave closely and wear a suit every time he flies, keep his lips closed during flights and ensure not to go to bath room in the middle of journey and sometimes prefer long drives to avoid.....

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